Mrs. Romney, Not Unlike Mr. Romney


Call it reverse sexism or perhaps sexism meets condescension.      Whatever it is, one must never, ever criticize the wife of a male politician, even if the politician himself is ridiculed every time he turns around.

Maybe Mitt Romney deserves to be mocked.     We know him partly by his quotes, including

*Corporations are people, my friend.
*I like being able to fire people who provide services to me.
*I'm not concerned about the very poor.   We have a safety net there.
*I should tell my story.    I'm also unemployed.
*There were a couple of times that I wondered whether I was going to get a pink slip.

More recently, he noted his wife "drives a couple of Cadillacs" and that he doesn't follow NASCAR "but I have some great friends who are NASCAR team owners."

Those quotes were widely disseminated, sometimes in context, sometimes not.        As a whole, if not individually, they paint a fairly accurate portrait of the 2012 GOP presidential nominee and were the subject of much criticism, some of it biting, in the media.       Now the candidate's wife, Ann Romney, has made an interesting comment.     She was quoted in full by the Washington Post's Chris Cillizza as saying

[O]ne thing this disease has been for me has been a wonderful teacher. And with that comes an ability for compassion for others that are suffering. And for me, I want to make my family bigger. Those that are suffering from M.S. or cancer or any disease I feel like I want to throw my arms open and say, welcome to my family and welcome to the place where I’ve been and, so, you know, we can be poor in spirit and I don’t look — I don’t even consider myself wealthy which is am interesting thing. It can be here today and gone tomorrow, and how I measure riches is by the friends I have and the loved ones I have and the people I care about in my life and that is where my values are and those are my riches so for me having done through a difficult period in my life both with M.S. and with breast cancer it has done something to my heart and it’s softened my heart and made me realize there are many people suffering in this country and they are suffering from things that aren’t financial — and some people are suffering from things that are financial, as well — but those that are suffering, for me, I just have a larger capacity for love, and for understanding.

Cillizza criticizes the liberal Center for American Progress for not presenting the entire quote, thereby creating the unfair impression that Ann Romney is out-of-touch about her family's wealth.    He writes

“I don’t even consider myself wealthy,"  Ann Romney said in an interview with Fox News on Monday. The remark was immediately chopped into a handy, dandy You Tube clip by Think Progress, a liberal blog affiliated with the Center for American Progress.

At some point, presumably soon after Cillizza's blog, Think Progress updated its original post, presenting Mrs. Romney's entire quote and including from Fox News' Neil Cavuto the question which prompted the statement:

Even in the face of attacks on your husband, or the famous Cadillac comment, that he [owns] two Cadillacs, or he says things that strike some as being out of touch, you defend him, but you don’t dwell on it, you shake your head as does he, but does it pound again and again, especially in light of Newt Gingrich now piling on, saying that your husband, maybe you by extension, the Romney family in general, is oblivious given your wealth, to the everyday concerns of average folks, like gasoline prices, like all this stuff? What do you say to that? 

As CAP's Alex Seitz-Wald commented, "The full context of Ann Romney’s question-and-answer makes clear that she was asked about the Romney family’s financial wealth."

Pretty slick, Chris.      Defend a wife of a candidate- always a safe, politically correct option- as "the victim of a bit of selective editing/purposeful misunderstanding on the part of Think Progress."         And then fail to provide full context yourself by neglecting to include the question to which she was responding.      

The query was not about a friend of hers with multiple sclerosis and breast cancer and how that has affected Ann's appreciation of friends and of life itself.       We have no doubt that Ann Romney, has known seriously ill people, is compassionate and values close friendships. Rather, the question was posed in light of the increasing evidence that the candidate is oblivious to the economic concerns of the American people, given the great wealth of the Romney family.        Ann Romney gave her answer:     "I don't even consider myself wealthy, which is an interesting thing."

Yes, it is.

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Not As Alarmed As He Pretends


You just knew that somehow, in some way, it made sense.      Or at least it was connected to reality, Rick Santorum-style.

Mother Jones has received a transcript of a town-hall meeting held by Rick Santorum in Clairton, Pennsylvania in February of 1994.     Santorum maintained

Most people agree a continuation of the current [welfare] system will be the ruination of this country.  We are seeing it. We are seeing the fabric of this country fall apart, and it's falling apart because of single moms....

Open up the current periodicals—study after study, article after article, children having children is destroying the fabric of our country.      If you want to close your eyes to it, if you don't care about it, if you don't want to solve it, if you want to continue the system, to let people stay and spiral—go ahead. Not with me.

Santorum contended, according to reporters Tim Murphy and Andy Kroll, that single mothers "needed politicians who weren't afraid of 'kicking them in the butt.'"

Welfare reform was enacted but there was no drop, rather an unfortunate increase, in the proportion of babies in the U.S.A. born to single mothers.     Nevertheless, the percentage of children born to teenage mothers fortunately has declined, suggesting the risk in conflating the two social problems, unwed motherhood and teenage motherhood.

Still, it is notable that Rick Santorum railed against unwed and/or teenage women having children, given that he is one of the most outspoken supporters of denying to females the option of ending, or preventing, an unwanted pregnancy.   In a 2006 interview, he contended contraception is "harmful to women" and "harmful to society" and in an October, 2011 interview labeled artificial birth control "a license to do things in the sexual realm that is counter to how things are supposed to be."    He pledged as president to work tirelessly to end federal spending for contraceptive services.  

In a recent opinion piece in the Philadelphia media, the ex-Pennsylvania Senator from Virginia approvingly quoted Bishop Thomas Tobin of Providence, R.I., who maintains "The point is that any Catholic in public office - his first commitment has to be to his faith ... because it involves your relationship with God."    Santorum believes that as a Roman Catholic politician, he is duty-bound to oppose abortion and birth control.

And yet that same individual was horrified in 1994, and probably still so, at the high rate of unwed- and teenage- motherhood.       The contradiction is, at first glance, striking.    

But there probably is no cognitive dissonance at all.       Mother Jones reports

Santorum has since toned down his broadsides against single mothers (if only slightly), but he's singled them out during his presidential campaign. In October he told Family Research Council president Tony Perkins that single moms are "the political base of the Democratic party." He continued, "Why? Because it's so tough economically that they look to the government for help and therefore they're going to vote. So if you want to reduce the Democratic advantage, what you want to do is build two-parent families; you eliminate that desire for government." 

Santorum's opposition to unwed mothers because they vote Democratic renders, remarkably, Rush Limbaugh accurate.        On January 4, trying to credit Santorum with helping engineer the K Street project (a connection the candidate, dishonest but a little more prudent, denies) maintained "What Rick Santorum and DeLay were trying to do was disempower the Democrats' bureaucrat lobbying reach into Washington."     Limbaugh added "What Rick Santorum has always been about is disempowering the Democrats."

But there is something more remarkable than Rush Limbaugh hitting upon the truth.      Few people would deny that of the three major GOP presidential contenders (Santorum, Newt Gingrich, Mitt Romney), the extremist, reactionary Rick Santorum is actually the most principled and committed to ideology.     And even he is less concerned with single motherhood because it makes "the fabric of this country fall apart" than about suppressing Democratic votes.

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Limbaugh Repeats Hannity's Falsehood


God's in his heaven and all's fine with the world;  Rush Limbaugh is back to lying.

He never really stopped, of course.    Usually he suspends dishonesty for the weekend, but this past weekend interrupted his rest by issuing a non-apology apology to Sandra Fluke.

Today, Limbaugh opened by explaining his decision to "apologize" to Fluke, took a break, then came back to deny, incredulously, that withdrawal of advertising from his program affected his decision to express regret, then almost as incredulously claimed

Advertising's a business decision. It's not a social one. Only the leftists try to use extortion, pressure, threats to silence opposing voices. We don't do that. Never, ever, do any of us on our side of the aisle try to suppress the speech or the voices of those with whom we disagree, and we never will. So, as you've always done, you make your own business decisions about the products and services you buy. But don't be like the opposition. That was my mistake last week. Don't make it yours.

Only the leftists try to use extortion, pressure, threats to silence opposing voices.     We don't do that.    Never, ever, do any of us on our side of the aisle try to suppress the speech or the voices of those with whom we disagree, and we never will.

Fortunately, karoli at Crooks and Liars caught Sean Hannity making the similar,  remarkable claim Friday night:

HANNITY: But here's the difference. I don't know any conservative, and you can't name one, that's hiring private investigators, that's organizing with the White House and collaborating with them, and attempting to get advertisers to pull out of shows in an attempt to silence voices. Can you name a conservative equivalent?

ROGINSKY: I don't follow conservative media, so I don't, but I can say this --

HANNITY: I can tell you, I can't name one, and I know conservative media.

Karoli notes at eight instances in which a conservative individual or organization has called for, or threatened, a boycott against a perceived transgression.        She summarizes (links, hers):

• One Million Moms first threatened a boycott of JC Penney's to force them to remove Ellen DeGeneres as their new spokeswoman. Their more recent effort is against Toys 'R Us for selling a newly-published Archie comic featuring a gay wedding. Their purpose, as stated on their website: "OMM is strictly an online campaign focusing primarily on the entertainment media (television, music, movies, etc.). The goal of this campaign is to stop the exploitation of children by such media." One Million Moms is a project of the Family Research Council, featured often on Fox News. Current boycott projects include Lifetime Television, ABC and Disney, and Clorox bleach.

• In 2009, Rush Limbaugh called on his listeners to boycott GM, saying "nobody wants to support an Obama company." Rasmussen Reports immediately followed up with a poll to see how many would support such a boycott.

• Last month the Catholic Family & Human Rights Institute called for a boycott of Girl Scout cookies because they support Planned Parenthood.

• Newsbusters, the conservative activist wing of the Media Research Center, criticized networks for playing up a boycott of Lowe's Corporation. The reason for the boycott? Lowe's had advertising placements on TLC's "All-American Muslim", and that outraged right-wing critics. Lowe's bowed to the pressure from enraged right-wingers and pulled the ads. Newsbusters chided networks for "playing up Lowe's outrage."

• American Family Association calls for a boycott of Old Navy for supporting the "It Gets Better" project.

• USA Christian Ministries calls for Starbucks boycott over tolerance for gay rights and anti-gun stance.

• Liberty Counsel calls for a boycott of PayPal after four accounts of anti-gay activists were suspended.

• Mike Huckabee, on Fox News, called for a boycott of NPR after Juan Williams was fired.

The planets are in alignment:   Rush Limbaugh is back in the saddle again, still making things up.


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Two- No, One Apology


Sometimes it seems like everyone is doing it.

No, not sex, which Rush Limbaugh believes is rampant among liberal American women, resulting, he thinks in a birth control pill being taken before each act.    No, it is the apology demanded far and wide by celebrities and non-celebrities alike.

An apology need not include the word "apology" or "apologize"; in fact, saying "I apologize" does not constitute in itself the statement of sincere regret for having erred which is the essence of an apology.     Neither does adding the word "sincere" or "sincerity" constitute an apology.    If someone actually is apologizing, it will be obvious without insertion of the term.

When American soldiers recently burned copies of the Koran at a military base in Afghanistan, President Obama sent President Hamid Karzai a letter in which he wrote

I convey my deep sympathies and ask you and the people to accept my deep apologies.      The error was inadvertent; I assure you that we will take the appropriate steps to avoid any recurrence, to include holding accountable those responsible.

This was a complete apology.      Although Obama noted, accurately, that the offending action was inadvertent, he also termed it an error, assured the reader that he would act to avoid a recurrence, and promised accountability.    

Significantly, the President avoided assuming any of the blame himself because, in fact, he was not to blame.      Assuming blame himself, rather than promising to hold accountable those actually responsible, would have, paradoxically, been a way to evade responsibility.

Case in point:    whenever the Philadelphia Eagles lose a game, head coach Andy Reid tells the assembled media "I have to do a better job" (in those exact terms, or very nearly so).       He never specifies how he has to do a better job, nor does he hold anyone else specifically responsible, either in his statement or subsequent decisions. He merely claims responsibility for something he knows no one holds him (but rather the players) responsible.

His act is wearing thin but after 13 years, almost everything does.     All in all, it has been an effective, though extremely disingenuous, tactic.

In steps Rush Limbaugh, a large man like Andy Reid and far wealthier with a much easier job.      Responding not to the furor over his remarks about Sandra Fluke and contraception but rather to the withdrawal of a few advertisers from his show, Limbaugh wrote

For over 20 years, I have illustrated the absurd with absurdity, three hours a day, five days a week. In this instance, I chose the wrong words in my analogy of the situation. I did not mean a personal attack on Ms. Fluke.

I think it is absolutely absurd that during these very serious political times, we are discussing personal sexual recreational activities before members of Congress. I personally do not agree that American citizens should pay for these social activities. What happened to personal responsibility and accountability? Where do we draw the line? If this is accepted as the norm, what will follow? Will we be debating if taxpayers should pay for new sneakers for all students that are interested in running to keep fit? In my monologue, I posited that it is not our business whatsoever to know what is going on in anyone’s bedroom nor do I think it is a topic that should reach a Presidential level.

My choice of words was not the best, and in the attempt to be humorous, I created a national stir. I sincerely apologize to Ms. Fluke for the insulting word choices.

Rush deserves credit for two things:   1) he expressed regret for "insulting word choices," constituting an apology (solely) for the language he applied to Ms. Fluke; 2) he used the words "sincerely apologize," thereby allowing the right-wing and the mainstream media, and the remaining sponsors, to claim that he "apologized."

For the most part, of course, this was no apology.        Even before Limbaugh tried, in the second paragraph, to justify virtually everything he said other than "slut" and "prostitute," he tipped us off by two claims in the first paragraph.     First, he claims status as a sort of Colbert-style comic, contending that he was utilizing absurdity which, ironically, is absurd. Second, he maintains "I did not mean a personal attack on Ms. Fluke."

A speaker need not intend for something to be personal attack for it to have been a personal attack.      Suggesting someone is a "slut" or "prostitute" clearly is a personal attack, unless Limbaugh's values are even more aberrant than he regularly demonstrates.   Moreover, claiming good intentions as a rationalization for one's actions while refusing to acknowledge the ill will they would inevitably cause is nearly the antithesis of a sincere statement of regret.    Limbaugh clearly did mean "a personal attack"- and acknowledging that the remarks would have such an impact would have suggested a measure of sincerity obviously lacking.

Still, Limbaugh's statement, while far less sincere or helpful, was more effective tactically than the President's statement.        Obama's use of the word "apologies" was unnecessary and gave fodder to Republicans who claim, inaccurately, that he "goes around the world apologizing for America."     By contrast, even though Limbaugh's continued attack, embedded in his second paragraph, on Fluke and the DHS policy is by turns misleading, inaccurate, and willfully blind to his own on-air history of obsessiveness with sex, he was wise to claim for himself a sincere apology.       That is all the more the case because the remarks were not sincere and in most ways a sharp contrast to apologetic.



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Republican Response Regrettable (And Lacking Alliteration)


Evan McMorris-Santoro of Talking Points Memo probably is a very nice man.     But is he living in an alternate universe?

Massachusetts' Scott Brown, recipient of gobs of Wall Street cash, voted for the Blunt amendment permitting all employers to deny to employees preventive health care on a whim.  If the employer can claim a religious or moral objection, any service is fair game and can be eliminated for the employee.    Worse yet, Brown then wrapped his attack on health care around the First Amendment, arguing that the measure enhanced religious freedom and was consistent with the position of the late Senator Edward Kennedy.     Wrong vote, cowardly (and misleading) excuse.

But Brown (as of now) stands alone in the GOP firmament in his condemnation of Rush Limbaugh, who this past week referred to Georgetown University law student Sandra Fluke as a "slut" or "prostitute."     He claimed, falsely and with obvious ignorance of the mechanism of birth control, that Fluke "said that she was having so much sex, she can't afford it."        

Brown tweeted "Rush Limbaugh's comments are reprehensible.    He should apologize."   National Republican Senatorial Campaign Committee chairwoman Carly Fiorina said the remarks were "insulting in my opinion," the next best thing to characterizing them flatly as "insulting;" and "a distraction from very real and important issues," suggesting that Limbaugh's primary sin may have been political ineptitude.

The assessments by Brown and Fiorina stand alone and don't warrant McMorris-Santoro's observation "looks like Republicans aren't going to stick by Rush Limbaugh this time."       The TPM contributor, as evidence, cites Speaker Boehner's spokesman who, channeling the old playground excuse "so's your old man," remarked "the speaker obviously believes the use of these words was inappropriate, as was trying to raise money off the situation."

McMorris-Santoro noted that House Oversight Committe Chairman Darrell Issa (reputed to be the wealthiest member of Congress) "does not agree 'with many comments that have been made during the effort to examine the constitutionality of Obamacare’s mandates on individual freedom, including the ones by Mr. Limbaugh, I find your narrow focus on this particular comment to be self-serving and dismissive of other inappropriate comments and attacks on Americans of faith.'"      And he calls that- wait for it- "the least condemning criticism of all the Republicans who weighed in Friday."     Criticism?

A little earlier, McMorris-Santoro had argued "With one phone call, President Obama has forced the Republican candidates for president into a Sophie’s Choice with potentially far-reaching implications: Do they stand up to Rush Limbaugh, who made divisive comments about a law student this week, or do they stand up for a highly influential conservative leader who’s embarrassed the Republicans who’ve crossed him in the past?"

Obama's phone call was commendable, strategically and ethically, but McMorris-Santoro takes from it the wrong lesson.       Blogging "early indications are Rick Santorum has chosen the former path," he notes the ex-Pennsylvania senator from Virginia remarked "He’s being absurd, but that’s you know, an entertainer can be absurd.      He’s in a very different business than I am.”     Santorum's statement was rather clever, but rather disingenuous and hardly critical.

Memo to McMorris-Santoro:     when an immensely influential political figure says something outrageous and a politician claims the guy is merely an "entertainer," he is excusing the speaker, holding him to a different, less severe (with apologies to Mitt Romney) standard. This is regularly demonstrated by Jon Stewart and Steve Colbert, who regularly make brilliant but outrageous comments- and have proven almost completely immune from criticism.      

Mitt Romney initially took a pass, first avoiding the controversy while later stating merely "I'll just say this which it's not the language I would have used."    Digby maintains Romney could have seemed "all prim and proper" if he had remarked "my parents taught me to be respectful of women and that isn't respectful."       It would have been mildly critical but not confrontational, and would have come off as charmingly old-fashioned.       There would have been no criticism of the candidate, especially because it would have appeared to be a shot against his parents.       Politicians and journalists know:    never, ever criticize parents.

Lord willing and the creek (Indians) don't rise, Senator Scott Brown will be displaced by Massachusetts voters with the remarkable Elizabeth Warren, and Brown's utter indifference to the importance of contraceptive, and other health care, coverage will play a role.     But as of now, on the issue of Rush Limbaugh, Brown's comment is about the only one not worthy of criticism.


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Fluke No Fluke



Rush Limbaugh keeps on going.     No one expected him to apologize for his remarks about Sandra Fluke, the Georgetown University law student who testified, before a hearing convened by Nancy Pelosi, about the Department of Health and Human Services' policy regarding contraceptive coverage under the Affordable Care Act.      And he didn't disappoint.

On Wednesday, it was

What does it say about the college coed Susan [sic] Fluke, who goes before a congressional committee and essentially says that she must be paid to have sex? What does that make her? It makes her a slut, right? It makes her a prostitute. She wants to be paid to have sex.

She's having so much sex she can't afford the contraception. She wants you and me and the taxpayers to pay her to have sex. What does that make us? We're the pimps.

On Thursday, Rush responded to criticism of his initial comments by remarking

'Without insurance coverage, contraception, as you know, can cost a woman over $3,000 during law school,' Fluke told the hearing. ... That’s a thousand dollars a year of sex -- and, she wants us to pay for it." Now, what does that make her? She wants us to buy her sex. She wants us to pay for her sex, and she went to a congressional committee to close the sale....

Folks, for all the hilarity that's contained in what's going on here...  Here's a woman exercising no self-control. The fact that she wants to have repeated, never-ending, as often as she wants it sex -- given.  No question about that.  Of course, it's normal.

After the report that a supportive President Obama called Ms. Fluke, Rush on Friday commented

Your daughter appears before a congressional committee and says she's having so much sex, she can't pay for it and wants a new welfare program to pay for it.

Obviously, attacking (without evidence) on radio a young woman whom one does not know for being a "slut" or "prostitute" is tasteless and misogynistic.        So is characterizing Fluke as someone who is "happily presenting herself as an immoral, baseless, no-purpose-to-her-life woman" who "wants all the sex in the world."        Of course, she is not a prostitute, never implied that she ever has been paid for sex, and Rush Limbaugh has no evidence that she is or has.     Nor has she advocated anyone being paid for sex.     But the issue has been raised:   is Sandra Fluke a "slut" who has inferred she wants that sex "whenever she wants it, all the time?"

I don't know Fluke any better than Rush Limbaugh but apparently unlike him, I have read her testimony.     And as you can see here, Sandra Fluke said this about her own sex life:

Nothing.    Fluke said nothing about her own sex life, let alone anything to suggest that she is sexually active.   Rush may imagine that she has, but as anyone who listens to him regularly and is not blinded by his/her status as a "dittohead" realizes, Limbaugh has an unhealthy obsession with sex.    Fluke summarized the reason for her testimony as

When I look around my campus, I see the faces of the women affected by this lack of contraceptive coverage.    And especially in the last week, I have heard more and more of their stories. On a daily basis, I hear yet from another woman from Georgetown or from another school or who works for a religiously-affiliated employer, and they tell me that they have suffered financially and emotionally and medically because of this lack of coverage.  And so, I’m here today to share their voices, and I want to thank you for allowing them – not me – to be heard.

She concluded

And even if that meant going to a less prestigious university, we refuse to pick between a quality education and our health. And we resent that in the 21st century, anyone think it’s acceptable to ask us to make this choice simply because we are women.

Many of the women whose stories I’ve shared today are Catholic women. So ours is not a war against the church. It is a struggle for the access to the health care we need.

The President of the Association of Jesuit Colleges has shared that Jesuit colleges and the universities appreciate the modifications to the rule announced recently. Religious concerns are addressed and women get the health care they need. And I sincerely hope that that is something we can all agree upon.

President Obama was right when he told Sandra that her parents have much reason to be proud of her.     And so, too, was Georgetown University President John J. DeGioia, who reminded the "Georgetown Community" that one of its own

was respectful, sincere, and spoke with conviction. She provided a model of civil discourse. This expression of conscience was in the tradition of the deepest values we share as a people. One need not agree with her substantive position to support her right to respectful free expression. And yet, some of those who disagreed with her position – including Rush Limbaugh and commentators throughout the blogosphere and in various other media channels – responded with behavior that can only be described as misogynistic, vitriolic, and a misrepresentation of the position of our student.




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Never Apologizing, Never Retreating



George Clooney was inteviewed recently by Brandon Voss of The Advocate and struck a liberal theme- in at least two ways.       According to The Huffington Post,

So why does "The Descendants" star -- who will next be seen in Dustin Lance Black's play "8," about California's voter-approved ban on same-sex marriage -- feel so passionate about marriage equality? "It's always been this albatross that stood out to me as the final leg of the civil rights movement," he told Voss

"Well before Prop. 8, I've made the point that every time we’ve stood against equality, we’ve been on the wrong side of history. It’s the same kind of argument they made when they didn’t want blacks to serve in the military, or when they didn’t want blacks to marry whites. One day the marriage equality fight will look as archaic as George Wallace standing on the University of Alabama steps keeping James Hood from attending college because he was black. People will be embarrassed to have been on the wrong side."

Support for gay marriage is one of the legs of the liberal/progressive value set (except for elected officials), particularly in Hollywood.      Perhaps more interesting, however, is Clooney's confidence, borne of today's universal acceptance of interracial marriage, that current opponents of  same-sex marriage "will be embarrassed to have been on the wrong side."

It's lovely to think so, but no.        In 2011, at least among members of one major political party in one very conservative state, there is little or no embarrassment at having been repulsed by the union of a white person and a black person.      

Lauren Frayer of AOL News reported last April

A new poll gauging Mississippi Republicans' preferences going into the 2012 election ended up revealing something more startling: 46 percent of GOP voters in the state think interracial marriage should be illegal.

Results were announced Thursday by Public Policy Polling, a polling firm based in North Carolina. The company asked 400 Republican primary voters about their preferences for candidates for state and national offices, as well as their views on interracial marriage.  

A whopping 46 percent of likely GOP primary voters said they think interracial marriage should be illegal, while only 40 percent said they think it should be allowed. Another 14 percent said they were unsure.

It was only 45 years ago that Mississippi legalized interracial marriage, and this poll indicates it continues to be a controversial subject.

It is a comforting trap, but a trap nonetheless, which many liberals, myself included, also fall into (and I don't mean too many commas in one sentence).    If only conservatives knew the facts, surely they'd understand!

It has been 45 years in Mississippi and still a plurality of Republicans believe interracial marriage should be illegal.         Whether prejudice, an unwillingness to accept the complexity and nuances of society, false narratives spun by the mainstream conservative media, or some other factor(s), conservatives hold some ideas completely divorced from reality.    They will not be moved by the expectation of a celebrity that they should feel guilty or may one day need to repent. Conservative- which is to say, the vast majority- Republicans are not like liberal Democrats.      

Consider the bailout of the auto industry, in which a great American institution was rescued from oblivion and about which many Republicans still are defiant.     Increasingly, being conservative means not only never having to admit having been wrong but also asserting that one was right, evidence be damned.






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